An hour north of Ojai takes you into a different world, the largest remaining grassland in California, a quarter-million acres of the Carrizo Plain National Monument. It is often called "the American Serengeti" and is the remnant of the great San Joaquin Valley grasslands that once covered most of the middle of the state.

Our guest has spent 15 years studying, learning, observing and taking photographs in this stunning setting. He published his beautiful collection of essays and photographs called aptly enough "Carrizo Plain." It's available around town at Poppies Art & Gift, Meg's Ojai House, Bart's Book and online. The introduction to the book is written by Neil Havlak, president of the Carrizo Plain Conservancy and contains many photos of the Tule elk, pronghorn antelope and varied raptors, including golden eagles. 

Carrizo Plain is also home to the periodic eruption of wildflowers - when conditions are perfect, it is among the most magnificent on the planet. The previous "bloom boom" was in 2019, another prior to that in 2017. "It was as if someone arrived on the Carrizo Plain armed with a massive paintbrush and splashed multi-colored hues across the open book-shaped mountains and arid grasslands," he writes.

Chuck has fashioned a career for himself as an outdoorsman - lifeguarding for Santa Barbara County in the summers, guiding kayakers around the Channel Islands and as a freelance writer and photographer. His work often appears in the Ojai Quarterly.

https://chuckgrahamphoto.com/ We did not talk about the impact of polio on FDR’s politics, Super Bowl III or ironwood carvings.